After the maelstrom of Prime Minister Theresa May's election crisis and a struggle in government over the shape of Brexit, business chiefs have a simple request for Britain: Give clarity on how the EU divorce might look. Since May nearly lost her job in a botched June 8 election gamble, ministers have sought to strike a more inclusive tone, even inviting in some chief executives to a 17th century manor house to discuss Brexit over a buffet lunch.

A City wag nicknamed G4S "guffaw-S". That was during the outsourcer's most accident-prone years. The high point was in 2013 when the group admitted it might have fitted electronic tags to offenders, ...